Jump to content
Click here to join us at 4pm Central time as we run through the arbitration decisions facing the Cubs, and look toward the offseason! ×
North Side Baseball

craig

Old-Timey Member
 View Profile  See their activity

  • Posts

    4,215

  • Joined

  • Last visited

 Content Type 

Profiles

Joomla Posts 1

Chicago Cubs Videos

Chicago Cubs Free Agent & Trade Rumors, Notes, & Tidbits

2026 Chicago Cubs Top Prospects Ranking

News

2023 Chicago Cubs Draft Picks

Guides & Resources

2024 Chicago Cubs Draft Picks

The Chicago Cubs Players Project

2025 Chicago Cubs Draft Pick Tracker

2026 Chicago Cubs Draft Tracker: Picks & Bonuses

Blogs

Events

Forums

Store

Gallery

Everything posted by craig

  1. craig
    I had heard Beeler was 90-92 with his fastball, so I guess if he's sitting at 92-94 and touching higher, he's already done it. That's great news. If he can locate a consistent low-to-mid 90s fastball, he can succeed at the upper levels. .... Do you guys know what the nature and extent of Beeler's current injury is? Pulled after 3 perfect innings a couple weeks ago, and hasn't pitched since. I agree on the Gibbs stuff. He's definitely on my list. My understanding is that he's a good and smart and advanced receiver, but that his arm just isn't really strong. My understanding is that the question had been his hitting, and that's been very promising thus far. I think he has some power potential, too, even if he hasn't shown much of that yet.
  2. craig
    Question: do you guys know the nature or severity of Dallas Beeler's injury? Got pulled after 3 perfect innings in his last start about 11 days ago or so. Anybody have any scoop?
  3. craig
    He's got a very big arm, so that's why I think he'd have a much better chance to reach the majors as a power reliever than as K-king hitter. When you whiff so much and walk so little, you need to hit a LOT more HR's than he does to cover it as a player. But probably wishing he was a major-league prospect is silly and I should be happy to have him as an organizational player getting some lucky BABIP. But I do believe he was originally signed as a pitcher, and they switched him to outfield because of his prodigious BP power, and hoped that some contact skill would come in time.
  4. craig
    Scouting question: What do we know about Bour? He's huge, LH, 22, has 7 HR's, and has excellent BB/K stats. I assume he fields and runs like a 25th-round 250-pounder? I guess I'm curious how many HR's he'd need to hit to overcome some of the other limitations?
  5. craig
    He's still K'ing like crazy, but he's done a nice job of keeping his BABIP up at .500. If he can sustain that, who knows? Not sure if that stats page I'm looking at already includes tonights action, but it's kind of interesting that when he puts the ball in play, not only is his batting an even .500, but 17 or the 19 in-play hits are singles. I still wish they'd just move him over to pitcher, but whatever.
  6. craig
    Box score shows Kurcz pitched relief. Is that true? I wonder who'll take his rotation spot? Anybody know if that was real, or one of the FSL box errors? I admit I'm kind of confused with what's status quo for Daytona's rotation. Whitenack out, Doug Davis in and will be out, Lorick in today, Kurcz out today. Will Kurcz go back in? Rhee? Will Kirk get promoted? Will be interesting to see it settle out.
  7. craig
    Raisin, how much of that is that they're going slow with Rhee post surgery. He's struggled last season, maybe he's just taking longer than normal to come back and they don't want to push it. This is his 3rd year since surgery, right? If he's still not healthy enough to pitch 3 years after his surgery, I think something's not quite right. He was pitching rehab games two summers ago. Aren't most guys are back and ready to be used full-bore within 32 months or less of successful surgery?
  8. craig
    McNutt was scheduled, and is on five days. But now Chen is listed instead.
  9. craig
    The typical BABIP in the majors is a nice round easy-to-remember .300. In this 2010 article, the most recent season had been 2009, with a .299 BABIP. Which would seem to put Vitters career only slightly below. However, minor-league BABIP is typically somewhat higher. (http://cutfour.com/2010/12/minor-league-babip/) Over the last five seasons, the average BABIP in full-season leagues has been a shade over .310. Last year it was .3134. Interestingly, there is only a modest "level" factor. In other words, there is no notable pattern getting higher or lower from A-AA-AAA. There are some modest league factors. The California league not surprisingly is high (.324 over the five years), the PCL is a little high (.317), and several are more in the .304 (Eastern)-.306 (FSL, Carolina)-.308 (Southern) range. So if Vitters is a career .297, he's definitely on the low side relative to minor leaguers, although not enormously so. Makes sense for a slow RHH who hits a fair amount of weak grounders and weak flies.
  10. craig
    I think given his draft past the Burgess was obviously the most famous name, but I think clearly Morris the shoulder surgery guy was the best prospect of the three. There are enough fringy lefties in the majors that Hicks has a shot too, just like Rosscup does. My impression was that Hicks was initially projected to perhaps throw hard, but that over his several years in the minors he's never actually added any velocity. Am I wrong? Or does he actually have a significantly plus fastball? I thought I'd seen somebody do an Archer comparison, which I thought was meaning a guy who was a super wildman elsewhere who might moderate his wildness to some extent. But there isn't the idea that Hicks has a big fastball like Archer or has electric stuff like Archer had and was known to have before we ever got him, is there?
  11. craig
    Clevenger 3 more hits. He's up into the .340's. Kind of like a Barney in terms of anti-K hitter, but with some power and more walks. Not sure if he has enough arm, but it would seem his bat is enough to contend for a backup job.
  12. craig
    His ERA was under 3 over his last 6 weeks or two months at Peoria. I recall before he got promoted looking in the Minor League box things that show the last ten starts, and he'd been under 3.0 ERA during that period. So while his overall Peoria numbers looked yucky, that was spring and he was quite effective for all of June, July, and August.
  13. craig
    Those are good points, video. Fleita said he's throwing 91-94. I'm not sure why a guy with a 91-94 sinker is an undertalented back-end guy. A 91-94 sinker could be way better fastball than what most major-league starters work with. I don't think there's any question but that a 91 sinker would be more useful than a 95 40seamer. The other thing is control. Scouts naturally focus on stuff, and kind of rank guys as front end, middle end, or back end prospects based on their raw stuff. But we all know that not everybody has the same command, and superior command can trump stuff routinely. If Whitenack combines a 91-mph sinker with excellent command, I think that provides the potential to be better than a mediocre rotation-filler. We'll see of course, and obviously I'm just an optimistic fan. But a lot of the runs a pitcher allows come not on their good stuff but on mistakes, and some guys who make mistakes more rarely have good success without exceptional velocity.
  14. craig
    I wonder if he really meant that, or meant Jackson in that context. The Hendry stuff tht Whitenack is 91-94, significantly up from last year, is pretty good info. The bit about Lake getting benched for not running out a fly ball is both sad and good. He seems like such a dope. He's fallen well out of my top-10 by now.
  15. craig
    That's far too quick for me. I'd probably sneak him into my top 15 now (admittedly he wasn't in my top 30 to start the season). 29 IP with 28 K and 1 BB between A+ and AA is ridiculous. Not too quick for me, he's obviously a top-10 guy at this point. Good fastball, good control, great results, he's already in AA, no brainer. It's not like guys 8-9-10 are all HOF talents. I had him 18 during winter, 15 after Chirinos/Guyer/Lee got removed. If he was 15 going into the season, he's easily leapfrogged at least five guys to hop into my top 10. If he's 94-95, great control, pure anti-HR guy, plenty of deception, that sounds qualified to make our top ten. I understand that who knows how accurate the 94-95 is, I have no idea if that source knows what he's talking about. And of course 94-95 is most likely "topping"/"touching", and he's probably actually working more 89-92. But an 89-92 commanded sinker, a guy can win a lot of big-league starts with that.
  16. craig
    .520 OBP. Crazy. Alcantara is at .309. He's gotten two hits in five of his last six games, I think. AzPhil has kind of raved about his arm and his SS range, although in past I think he's been pretty errorific. When a gifted defensive SS is hitting .300 in full-season as a teenager, that's worth keeping an eye on.
  17. craig
    Yeah, that is pretty remarkable. Micah gibbs is also kind of a small-sample funny-stats guy. His OBP is 100 points above his slugging. And his .475 OBP is quite high. Also odd to be such a solidly built guy (he lists at 225/5'11") but have no power. (He's hitting .344, but only one XBH thus far.)
  18. craig
    Not for Vitters. He's been pretty consisently a really low BABIP guy, just like Brett Jackson has consistently been a really high BABIP guy. In Vitters case, probably the combo of being slow, slow out of the box, and hitting a lot of weakish grounders probably contributes.
  19. craig
    Hicks taken out in the 5th. 8K/2BB/1HR/2ER (so far). Szczur at .238 for the moment.
  20. craig
    Kevin Goldstein responding on Twitter: Tall, downhill FB w/sink; true plus curve. Prospect, but not huge RT @Carl9730: @Kevin_Goldstein What do you know about Robert Whitenack?
  21. craig
    Heh, I had him in my top-20, (pat self on back), but I don't think anybody else did. And even as a fan, what I liked about him and optimistically projected doesn't at all match with what he's done now. THis profile has changed. Last year the profile was a strike-throwing groundball guy, pitch-to-contact. As such, he was low walk/low K/high hits, but with low HR's I thought he had a chance to work and he was highly projectible. But he was anything but dominant. And while I projected that he *might* get stronger and faster, I didn't anticipate turning into a dominant unhittable K-guy. The carryover is the control and the extreme groundball profile. But the dominant unhittable K-guy, that's new. I think that's what can happen when a good control pitcher comes up with a knockout breaking ball.
  22. craig
    http://www.baseballamerica.com/today/prospects/chat/2011/2611609.html Unfortunately to date Szczur has a .646 OPS at Peoria this year and had a .608 OPS at Peoria last summer in a brief showcase. Callis is basing his grade on his Boise numbers last year, but the longer he goes without translating his Boise hitting to Peoria, the more the Boise stats will be forgotten and his status could decline. I'd sure like to see him get cooking offensively.
  23. craig
    I'd forgotten about Rhee. Yesterday when Tim was mentioning Tennessee rotation not being as good as usual, I was thinking Whitenack was about the only A-ball guy who might end up both being a good major leaguer and spending time at Tenn this year. Obvoiusly if Struck is going to end up a good major leaguer, there's probably also a good chance that would involve him pitching well this summer and getting promoted to AA as ;well, although I'm not sure he's going to ever be a good major leaguer that we look back and say "and struck was on that 2011 AA staff, too...") But I'd forgotten Rhee, because I haven't been a big believer since the surgery. But I know some of the posters have been pretty strong Rhee believers (I hope for good reason.) If indeed his arm is recovered enough so that he's going to be a winning major leaguer, then his arm will probably be recovered enough that he'll pitch his way out of Daytona at some point this summer. So if years out Rhee is a good major leaguer and we are looking back at the 2011 Tennessee staff, I suspect we'll include Rhee's name on the 2011 staff. If he isn't healthy enough and good enough to pitch himself out of Daytona this summer, then he'll probably never be healthy enough and good enough to be a good major leaguer either. Would sure be cool if he emerged as a value prospect.
  24. craig
    Cal or anybody else, What do we know about Loosen from his draft reports? Was he a slot guy or an overslot with potential and a supposedly good arm? Just curious whether he might be serious, or just a college pitcher taking advantage of teenagers. Cal, do you recall seeing Austin Reed's name in any of Phil's reports? I'm assuming he's hurt or something?
  25. craig
    Given how weak the AA bullpen has been, I'd think it won't be too long or too hard for him to get the promotion. I admit I was pretty surprised he returned to A. That said, the guy has been on an improvement trajectory, at least when we compare 2008 - 09/10 - now. Maybe the improvement from 09 to 10 wasn't that much (although his ERA did drop a bunch, while he was being promoted to Daytona, and his K-rate rose some too.) 2008: 29/35/59 walks/innings/K's 2009: 45/97/117 2010: 29/64/97 2011: 1/9/14 thus far Basically his walk rate has gone from horrific-bad-bad-good (thus far). It's too early to know if it's sustainable, but this could be the first year where his walk/inning ratio is much more favorable than 1/2, which is pretty bad even if way better than his rookie year. If he can get the walks down, or keep them down as he's done so far this month, then he's going to go places. Who knows, maybe he was challenged last year and this that he needed to reduce those walks to go to AA, and now he's finally able to do that?
×
×
  • Create New...